Vela

Newest version

Download
(HTTPs) version
2.0.0.0 released on 24.12.2016. This requires at
least Windows
7 SP1.
For an operating system before Windows 8, if you aren't current
with all the updates, you might have to first install Microsoft's
.Net 4.5 from here.

Description

Vela is a mix between an instant messenger and an email
manager applications.

Vela combines the communication speed of instant messages with
the storage features of emails, and adds digital signatures,
encryption, reliability of delivery and lack of spam.

Vela has no centralized authentication service. The
authentication is achieved with UPNs. A UPN (= Universal Peer
Name) is a text made of a few tens of random-looking characters.
UPNs are shared by the users like email addresses.

A key feature of Vela is that messages can be transferred
offline from peer to peer (that is, even when their computers are
not connected to the Internet), by exporting and importing them.

Continuing the tradition started with PicturePuzzle
and Wallperizer of
doing something interesting with images, Vela lets you (remotely)
change the wallpaper of your close friends, and even to write
text on it. If you want to share images, wish happy holidays or
even make a love declaration, see how
to send a wallpaper.

Authenticity

Attesting document

To
verify the authenticity of the Vela archive, download the
attesting document and use the "Root-verify attesting
document" button from the "General" tab of Vela.
This, of course, assumes that you already have a version of Vela
that you can trust. This method can be used to verify application
updates.

You
can use the same attesting document to verify the authenticity
using version 1.0.0 or 1.0.1.

This
method is authoritative but it requires that you already use a
trusted version of Vela. The security of this method doesn't
depend on the security of this website.

Hashes

The
SHA-512 of the Vela archive is
3B20-8928-8F22-D1E7-664A-6AAB-549E-5078-D557-A498-3FC8-90BD-7CCB-F1B8-33E4-ED1C-1E21-4A78-9CD7-1581-1E2C-4A03-42BB-1BC0-2FDC-CE17-5BEA-8823-3005-93F7-6CF6-57F5.

The
SHA-256 of the Vela archive is
CB65-00FA-C8E0-402D-F432-D07B-43E5-672D-4735-91C2-C03E-ACC4-A6E4-2A0B-208E-E9FA.

The
security of this method depends on the security of this website,
specifically on the accuracy of the hashes
shown here.

Online timestamp

Download
this file and then
drag-and-drop it together with the Vela archive on this
webpage in order to verify the authenticity assured by the
timestamp service.

The authenticated time (in GMT
format) is 2016-12-24 21:56:56.

The
security of this method depends on the security of this website,
specifically on the accuracy of the time
shown here.

Security notices

Please update to the newest version of Vela.

Versions 1.0.0 through 1.4.3

The side-channel timing attack protection had a bug.

Versions 1.0.2 through 1.3.0.4

If you have created vaults with these versions of Vela after
you have reopened the storehouse in which they are stored, and
you've used a simple password for it, it's recommended to create
new vaults instead of those, if you have reasons to believe that
you may be the target of a highly resourceful attacker who can
retrieve information from your computer.

Versions 1.0.0 through 1.0.1

If you have created your storehouse / vault with these
versions of Vela, it's recommended to create a new storehouse /
vault, if you have reasons to believe that you may be the target
of a highly resourceful attacker who can retrieve information
from your computer.

Running on tablets

It's possible to run the program on tablets which have full
Windows.

However, by default, Windows on tablets uses a sleep mode
called "connected standby", mode which once active
stops all desktop applications (but not the ModernUI ones).

In this mode, if the tablet's display is turned off, the
connected standby mode is activated, that is, there is no
separation between the display and the sleep mode.

In order to deactivate the connected standby and keep the
desktop applications running when the display turns off, you have
change something in the tablet's registry.

Go to the "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ System \
CurrentControlSet \ Control \ Power \ CSEnabled" key and set
its value to 0 (from its default value of 1). Then restart the
computer. Then, in the current power plan set the time after
which the display is turned off.

Note that once the connected standby mode is deactivated, the
tablet can no longer sleep, though it can hibernate, so even if
the display is turned off, the tablet will consume a lot more
energy than with the connected standby mode active.

History of changes

Version 2.0.0.0

Feature: Added account
aliases to minimize the risk of sending letters to the wrong
contacts. In the "User interface" tab of the
"Application Configuration" window, check the "Letters
may be sent only if they are prefixed with an account alias"
check-box. Also, modify the account alias for every account that
you have.

Feature: Added the ability to run command lines on the
computers of trusting peers. In the "Edit Account"
window, see the "Remote access" tab.

Improvement: Letters can be exported in an obfuscated form (to
look like random data), like when they are sent online, by using
a non standard extension for the saved file. Note that while
spies can only see random data, anyone who has the UPN of the
recipient can see that the data contains a letter (though its
message remains hidden). The size of the saved file may vary with
up to 64 KiB, to hinder statistical analysis as much as possible.
The recipients of such letters must have a version of Vela which
supports this feature.

Improvement: Double-click an image preview to open the image
file in the default image viewer application.

Improvement: The retry schedule for sending requests to the
remote peers is continuously randomized.

New emoticons: Added 21 emoticons.

Bug workaround: A .Net bug causes parts of code which are
compiled for 64-bit to run much slower than when compiled for
32-bit. The workaround has increased the file transfer speed, for
the reference setup, from 9 MB / s to 13 MB / s. When Microsoft
will fix this bug, the speed will increase a bit more.

Bug fixes.

Version 1.4.5.1

Bug fix: Vela would freeze when trying to send / receive
messages with some odd combinations of line breaks (because the
removal of multiple consecutive line breaks would enter into an
infinite loop).

Version 1.4.5.0

Improvement: Added the "Filler UPN classifiers count"
edit-box in the "Advanced" tab of the "Application
Configuration" window, to edit the number of UPN classifiers
which are registered on the peer network, as filler peer names.

The filler UPN classifiers are used strictly to create a
larger peer network because the PNRP has problems resolving
remote peer names when just one local peer name is registered.
If the PNRP still can't find peers, increase this value; it's
useful if the remote peers also increase this value.

Because the filler classifiers have the same size and
structure as normal UPN classifiers, and because a fixed number
of them is registered on the network, an attacker can't know how
many vaults a peer has. However, if the peer creates a new
vault, the attacker will see a change in the registered
classifiers.

Version 1.4.2.0

Improvement: The handling of the letter flags has been
revamped to allow easier navigation and updating.

Improvement: Added an edit-box in the "Advanced" tab
of the "Application Configuration" window to edit the
size of the cache which is used for sending and receiving data
through the network, for large data transfers.

Improvement: Added the "Retry send" menu in the
context menu of the list of letters, to retry to send the focused
letter as soon as possible.

Improvement: The letters which are copied to the clipboard are
numbered.

Improvement: The notification window which is displayed in the
top-right corner of the main window is hidden when the
application is minimized or hidden.

Improvement: The "Retry" state of accounts has a
small orange rectangle as prefix, just like the "Retry"
state of letters has. The "Next time" value is also
updated every time the tooltip is opened, just like it happens
for letters.

Improvement: The details of pending accounts can be viewed by
entering in "edit" mode.

Version 1.4.1.0

Improvement: When a letter which contains the ";Bell",
";Horn" or ";Urgent" emoticon symbol is
received, a desktop notification is shown in the bottom-right
corner of the screen (until it's clicked).

Improvement: It is periodically checked (and shown) if a "New
letter" notification exists but the application's button is
not shown in the system's taskbar.

Bug fix: It was possible for "New letter"
notifications to not be shown, due to optimizations made by the
infrastructure.

Version 1.4.0.0

Improvement: The maximum possible file transfer speed has
increased with about 60%. Due to network conditions, this
improvement will benefit mostly file transfers over the local
area network.

Bug fix: If a vault was deleted, all the accounts were
deleted.

Bug fix: If several accounts referring to the same remote peer
existed in a storehouse, if one of them was deleted then letters
were no longer received and the accounts were no longer loaded
until they were manually recreated.

In order to benefit from the file
transfer speed improvement, you and your contacts must use at
least version 1.4 of Vela. In the case of very fast networks, in
order to achieve the entire potential of the improvement, you and
your contacts must use accounts created using (the UPNs of)
vaults generated with at least version 1.4 of Vela.

If you generate a vault with at
least version 1.4 of Vela and you send its UPN to some people,
you can communicate with those people only if they also have at
least version 1.4 of Vela.

Tests have shown that, for a 1 Gbps
wired local area network, the transfer speed (for large files) is
8...12 MB / s.

Technical explanation:

The socket communication
buffer size is much higher for file transfers.

Action requests are encrypted
once with the recipient's public identity, and once during frame
obfuscation with the encryption key of the recipient's UPN.
However, an action response was until now once encrypted with
the encryption key from the request, and once during frame
obfuscation with the same key, which means that the first
encryption layer is redundant. By removing the first encryption
layer (only for file transfers), the file transfer speed is
increased without compromising the security.

Version 1.3.2.0

Improvement: Improved file transfer state on the sender's
side. The sender now sees either a transferred or error state. If
the "√" character is shown before the number of
files, it's certain that the files have been fully transferred.

Bug fix: The resolution of the alternative peer addresses was
performed (in some cases) only if the "Use UPN resolvers"
was checked (in the "General" tab of the "Application
Configuration" window).

Version 1.3.0.4

Improvement: The "Select emoticon" window remembers
its size, position and last viewed category.

Small changes.

Version 1.3.0.3

Improvement: To remove a "New letter" notification,
you can no longer click outside the draft letter text-box; users
could have easily missed notifications by scrolling the list of
letters because they were focusing on the list.

Small changes.

Version 1.3.0.2

Improvement: Pressing the "Ctrl + E" key in the
"Select Emoticon" window updates the emoticons with the
custom ones.

Improvement: Added a confirmation query for the "Update
emoticons" menu from the context menu of the list of
letters.

Improvement: Better updating performance when custom emoticons
are received in a letter.

Bug fix: When multiple emoticon images where shown below a
letter's summary, the images were not clear.

Bug fix: The PNRP was started (but no UPNs were registered)
even when the peer was offline.

Small changes.

Version 1.3.0.1

Improvement: Added the "Attach custom emoticons"
menu to the context menu of the draft letter text-box (from the
"Letters" tab), menu which attaches the (local peer's)
custom emoticons to the draft letter.

Version 1.3.0.0

Improvement: Better organization for the emoticons, and better
user interaction with the emoticon category buttons.

Improvement: Partial frames for animated images are supported.

Improvement: When a newer page from the list of letters is
shown, the list is scrolled to the top, not to the bottom, in
order to preserve the continuity of reading while switching the
current page back and forth.

Small changes.

Version 1.2.0.8

Improvement: Added a workaround for a .Net bug where an image
which is retrieved from the clipboard is saved blank / garbled,
if it was first processed in another application.

Improvement: The summary of the letters (from the list of
letters) which have no image preview extend to the margin of the
list.

Improvement: The transient letters are deleted even when the
operating system is closing, at least if it waits for the
application enough time.

Improvement: Better contrast for some emoticon images, and
added several emoticon symbols (mainly for the kind which start
with ":").

Improvement: Better detection when a "New letter"
notification has to be removed after the application's main
window is focused.

Improvement: When the "Alternative peer address" or
"Overridden remote port" is changed in the "Edit
Account" window, the letters are sent as soon as possible to
the remote peer.

Improvement: When the application is started for the first
time, a message window lets the user to either create or open a
storehouse. This is useful when the user reinstalls the operating
system.

Small changes.

Version 1.2.0.6

Improvement: Better detection of the moment when a peer comes
online after a long period of being offline.

Improvement: Multiple consecutive line breaks are reduced to a
single one in a letter's summary.

Improvement: Added a button in the "Application" tab
which opens a command line window with the PNRP state.

Version 1.2.0.5

Improvement: The summary of the letters (from the list of
letters) is colored differently for the sender and for the
recipient.

Improvement: The list of letters is scrolled a single item at
a time when the mouse wheel is rotated.

Improvement: When the flag filter or the page is changed in
the "Letters" tab, the list of letters is scrolled to
the bottom.

Bug fix: Double-clicking on the scrollbar from the list of
letters was opening a letter (in a separate window).

Bug fix: Letter import was failing.

Version 1.2.0.4

Improvement: When many files are attached, it's not checked
that all of them can be read, which makes the attaching much
faster.

Improvement: A more descriptive error is shown when a UPN /
alternative peer address can't be resolved.

Bug fix: When an empty file was among some files to attach, no
file was attached; the empty files are not attached anymore.

Small changes.

Version 1.2.0.3

Improvement: It's possible to send the draft letter (from the
"Letters" tab) by pressing the "Enter" key
rather than "Ctrl + Enter"; see the "User
interface" tab of the "Application Configuration"
window for options.

Improvement: If an error occurs while trying to open a
storehouse, the user is automatically prompted to type the
password (again).

Improvement: The design of the list of letters is slightly
more compact.

Improvement: When a letter contains an emoticon symbol, its
"No preview" / speaker image preview is not shown, but
the emoticon thumbnail is shown instead.

Bug fix: Sometimes the application would crash, especially
immediately after sending a letter.

Small changes.

Version 1.2.0.2

Bug fix: The image preview of an attached image file was not
being shown when an emoticon symbol was included in the letter.

Small changes.

Version 1.2.0.1

Bug fix: The image preview of a received letter was not being
shown if the file transfer took more than a fraction of a second.

Version 1.2.0.0

Feature: Expanded the support for animated images.

Feature: The emoticon column from the list of letters shows a
preview of an image attached to each letter, if one is available,
instead of the letter's emoticon thumbnail image. Animated images
are being animated.

Feature: If a letter's summary (= the message part shown in
the list of letters) contains several emoticon symbols, the
associated images are displayed below the summary.

Version 1.1.0.0

Feature: Added tooltip for the emoticon thumbnail column (from
the letter list), which shows the full-sized preview of an image
file attached to the letter (if that exists), or the full-sized
emoticon.

Feature: The image from the clipboard can be pasted into the
message text-box (in the "Letters" tab) in order to
attach it as a file.

Improvement: The text to write on wallpaper has no more lower
size limit, that is, any text (excluding the ";Paradise"
emoticon) will be written.

Improvement: When attaching files, they are checked to see if
they can be read.

Improvement: The recipient of a letter sees a clear error
message when a file attached to the letter is being used (by
another application) and can't be downloaded.

Improvement: To remove a "New letter" notification,
you can now also hide (not minimize) the application's main
window.

Improvement: Pressing the "Ctrl + C" key copies to
the clipboard the text selected in the focused letter (from the
letters list).

Improvement: The time of the next retry is dynamically updated
(in the letter state tooltip).

Bug fix: Image files were not being shown in the selection
window for a vault's photo.

Bug fix: A trivial error was occurring when files were being
downloaded and the letter didn't have the ";Paradise"
emoticon.